OREANDA-NEWS. February 04, 2011. PwC and Senteo Inc present the results of the annual retail banking sector survey “Customer Experience Index 2010: The state of retail banking following the financial crisis”. The survey covers 90 retail banks from Russia, Ukraine, the Czech Republic and Slovakia and rates them on the basis of five core elements of customer experience: Brand, Communication, Environment, Offering and Culture, reported the press-centre of PwC.

For the last four years an average customer experience score in Russia demonstrates insignificant, but positive dynamics, in spite of economic downturn. This year Top 10 Russian performers include an equal quantity of Russian banks and banks with foreign shareholders. Alfa-Bank maintains its overall lead in the ranking. CREDIT BANK OF MOSCOW entered the Top 10 for the first time at the 9th position.

NOMOS-BANK, Bank Zenit, Probusinessbank and Master-Bank demonstrate most dynamic uprise in the Index. Russian banks also show higher scores in average Environment, Offering and Culture rates.

This year’s study introduces a special section dedicated to sales effectiveness. The results have demonstrated strong correlation between sales effectiveness and customer experience. Banks with high scores in customer experience show good results in sales effectiveness.

The research also yielded an interesting dynamic showing that banks with higher customer experience scores tend to have a larger share of demand deposit balances when compared to their total deposit balances.  While total deposit balances at top-ranked banks are about five times higher, the volume of their accumulated demand balance amount is 13 times bigger that of banks with the lowest CEI scores.

“Today banks are undergoing uneasy period of transformation when customer’s loyalty is once again growing in prominence for superior performance. Banks that treat customers seriously have fairly consistent positive results every year. While banks with lack of attention to customer experience show either inconsistently or consistently poor results. In the next year report we plan to include a list of the most consistent banks in terms of customer experience, add new countries and introduce new areas for study. I do believe this survey serves as a benchmark for Russian retail banking industry”, – commented Geoffrey Nicholson, PwC Financial Services Advisory Leader for Russia.

“Ultimately, things like product innovation and personalization, service quality improvement and efficiency, greater access and convenience are the true signs of better environment in the banking industry. Customers are quick to notice improvements like these and tend to value them even more now than before the financial crisis. An average customer has become more demanding and expects better support from all service providers, whether banks or other retailers”, – added Michael Ruckman, Founder and President of Senteo Inc.